Most of the photos on this site were extracted from reference images (high-resolution tiffs, 20 to 200 megabytes in size) from the Library of Congress research archive. (To query the database click here.) Many were digitized by LOC contractors using a Sinar studio back. They are adjusted by your webmaster for contrast and color in Photoshop before being downsized and turned into the jpegs you see here.
Vintage photos of:

"Boy probably about 13 years old, tying strips which he has taken away from the planer." Schultze Waltum Planing Mill at Evansville, Indiana. October 1908. View full size. Photograph by Lewis Wickes Hine.

August 1942. "Mrs. Eloise J. Ellis has been appointed by civil service to be senior supervisor in the Assembly and Repairs Department at the Naval Air Base, Corpus Christi, Texas. She buoys up feminine morale in her department by arranging suitable living conditions for out-of-state employees and by helping them with their personal problems." View full size. 4x5 Kodachrome transparency by Howard Hollem for the Office of War Information.

Ensign Noressey and Cadet Thanas at the Naval Air Base, Corpus Christi, Texas. August 1942. View full size. 4x5 Kodachrome transparency by Howard Hollem.

Grandstands at the Chicago Coliseum awaiting delegates to the Republican National Convention in June 1916. View full size. G. Grantham Bain Collection.

Eighteen-year-old Ruth Malcomson, Miss Philadelphia of 1924. Later that year in Atlantic City, she would be crowned Miss America. View full size. 5x7 glass negative, Atlantic Foto Service/George Grantham Bain Collection.

New York Yankees outfielder Babe Ruth, in a Giants uniform, with Giants manager John McGraw at an exhibition game with the Baltimore Orioles on October 3, 1923, at the Polo Grounds. Ruth played in the Giants outfield for the game, which was a benefit. View full size. George Grantham Bain Collection.